Who's local? NYers and belonging

"No matter how long you have been here, you are a New Yorker the first time you say, That used to be Munsey's, or That used to be the Tic Toc Lounge. That before the internet cafe plugged itself in, you got your shoes resoled in the mom-and-pop operation that used to be there. You are a New Yorker when what was there before is more real and solid than what is here now." (Colson Whitehead, "City Limits," The Colossus of New York)

It's the eternal fight. Who belongs here? Who gets to claim New Yorker status? Who are the arrivistes and who are the natives?

My family's been here since 1959, I was born here, went to public school, have witnessed the city up close and personal for at least half of my life. I have no doubts about my New York-ness. But there are others who can also claim it.

When Whitehead's essay came out, it hit a chord with me and all my old New York friends. It was a point of connection between us native-born and those who had gone native. But it still required a price of entry. While Whitehead focuses on personal geographies, what is implied is a series of relationships, not just to sites, but to communities.

Which brings me to a couple of pieces that came out this week. David Gonzalez, the NY Times' BoogieRican conscience, wrote a post in the City Room blog about the unbearable whiteness (and occasional blackness) of the city's "Ask a Local" tourism campaign.

David has several beefs, but one is that of all the celebs featured in the ads, 80% are white and none are Latino, in a city that's currently 27% Latino. NYC&Co. said that Willie Colón will be in a future ad, as will America Ferrera (Mexican Ugly Betty is from Jackson Heights; Honduran America is from LA).

But the deeper issue is that the celebs featured, whether only nominal NYers (Jimmy Fallon?) or bona fide New Yorky people (Debbie Harry, born and raised in New Jersey), end up giving very Manhattan-below-96th St.-centric advice, as if there is nothing to see in the nabes where non-whites live.

This was one of the reasons I co-wrote Nueva York. I wanted others to come to my city and do the sort of tourism I do when I travel. Check out different nabes, different groups within a city, their clubs, their markets, their everyday lives. But NYC&Co. (which was supremely uninterested in our project) has no imagination.

Then there was the hanging-on-a-slim-thread cover story in this week's New York magazine, another retread of Brooklyn as the site of anxiety over who "belongs" more: the "brownstoners" or the "bitter renters." All assumed to have access to home ownership if only they tried hard enough. Public housing people (never mind any Section 8 or been-in-the-hood-before-it-was-desirable folks) are only background at best, a nuisance at worst.

It's one of my basic beefs about changes in NY chemistry. The city has always had ambitious young white things moving in among the native poor. But it used to be they had to learn to get along. What's new is that people with $3M homes think that somehow entitles them to more rights about the space than their poorer neighbors. Call it emotional eminent domain.

[pix of my high school, Newtown, in Elmhurst, via forgotten-ny.com; Screen cap of Debbie Harry "Just Ask the Locals" ad via NYC&Co.; illustration for "The What You Are Afraid Of" via NY Mag]

Comments

[Kiko Jones]

You know, nothing against your boy Willie Colón or América Ferrara, but if they wanted big names, among the plethora of brown stars we've got, there's Jimmy Smits, John Leguizamo, Marc Anthony, J-Lo, not to mention A-Rod and/or José Reyes, etc etc etc

As for the New York mag piece (which I read and found to be such a mostly pointless, navel-gazing exercise):

"The city has always had ambitious young white things moving in among the native poor. But it used to be they had to learn to get along. What's new is that people with $3M homes think that somehow entitles them to more rights about the space than their poorer neighbors. Call it emotional eminent domain."

Perfect, my dear. Just perfect.